London Daily

Focus on the big picture.
Wednesday, Oct 15, 2025

American-style voter ID laws are coming to Britain

American-style voter ID laws are coming to Britain

VOTING IN MAINLAND Britain is astonishingly easy. You turn up at a polling station and state your name and address. An official finds your name on a list, draws a line through it, then hands you your ballot. The question must have occurred to many people: couldn’t somebody else pretend to be me?
Many Britons believe that happens a lot. In early 2019 Ipsos MORI, a pollster, found that 58% thought personation—pretending to be somebody else—was a serious problem nationally. Asked why they thought that, some said they had heard about fraud in the media while others cited local rumours. A few said it was simply human nature.

Personation was indeed once widespread in Northern Ireland, which is why the province has required identification since 1985. Elsewhere in Britain it is extremely rare. If somebody turns up at a polling station and finds that their name is already crossed off, they are given a “tendered” ballot. Just 1,359 of those were handed out in the December 2019 general election, out of an electorate of 47.5m, and tendered ballots are issued for other reasons too. Personation fraud was alleged 33 times that year, resulting in one conviction and one caution.

Still, the government judges the threat to the democratic process sufficient to warrant a big change to electoral rules. On May 11th it announced that it will legislate to require in-person voters to show photo ID. This is trickier in Britain, which does not require people to carry ID cards, than in countries which do. Driving licences and passports will be acceptable; so will pensioners’ bus passes and the “blue badges” held by disabled people. Anyone without approved photo ID will be allowed to apply for a free card.

Such a change would not block many people from voting. Seven local authorities asked voters for various forms of identification in May 2019, after warning that they would be doing so. On average, 0.4% of would-be voters who were asked for ID failed to show it, were turned away, and did not return to the polling station.

But many more might conclude that voting has become too much of a hassle, and not bother. “Not everyone gets as excited about elections as we do,” says Jess Garland of the Electoral Reform Society, which opposes the change. Any effect is likely to be uneven. A poll for the government found that 10% of non-white people would be less likely to vote in person if they were required to show photo ID, compared with 5% of whites.
Newsletter

Related Articles

0:00
0:00
Close
Erika Kirk Delivers Moving Tribute at White House as Trump Awards Charlie Presidential Medal of Freedom
British Food Influencer ‘Big John’ Detained in Australia After Visa Dispute
ScamBodia: The Chinese Fraud Empire Shielded by Cambodia’s Ruling Elite
French PM Suspends Macron’s Pension Reform Until After 2027 in Bid to Stabilize Government
Orange, Bouygues and Free Make €17 Billion Bid for Drahi’s Altice France Telecom Assets
Dutch Government Seizes Chipmaker After U.S. Presses for Removal of Chinese CEO
Bessent Accuses China of Dragging Down Global Economy Amid New Trade Curbs
U.S. Revokes Visas of Foreign Nationals Who ‘Celebrated’ Charlie Kirk’s Assassination
AI and Cybersecurity at Forefront as GITEX Global 2025 Kicks Off in Dubai
DJI Loses Appeal to Remove Pentagon’s ‘Chinese Military Company’ Label
EU Deploys New Biometric Entry/Exit System: What Non-EU Travelers Must Know
Australian Prime Minister’s Private Number Exposed Through AI Contact Scraper
Ex-Microsoft Engineer Confirms Famous Windows XP Key Was Leaked Corporate License, Not a Hack
China’s lesson for the US: it takes more than chips to win the AI race
Australia Faces Demographic Risk as Fertility Falls to Record Low
California County Reinstates Mask Mandate in Health Facilities as Respiratory Illness Risk Rises
Israel and Hamas Agree to First Phase of Trump-Brokered Gaza Truce, Hostages to Be Freed
French Political Turmoil Elevates Marine Le Pen as Rassemblement National Poised for Power
China Unveils Sweeping Rare Earth Export Controls to Shield ‘National Security’
The Davos Set in Decline: Why the World Economic Forum’s Power Must Be Challenged
France: Less Than a Month After His Appointment, the New French Prime Minister Resigns
Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán stated that Hungary will not adopt the euro because the European Union is falling apart.
Sarah Mullally Becomes First Woman Appointed Archbishop of Canterbury
Mayor in western Germany in intensive care after stabbing
Australian government pays Deloitte nearly half a million dollars for a report built on fabricated quotes, fake citations, and AI-generated nonsense.
US Prosecutors Gained Legal Approval to Hack Telegram Servers
Macron Faces Intensifying Pressure to Resign or Trigger New Elections Amid France’s Political Turmoil
Standard Chartered Names Roberto Hoornweg as Sole Head of Corporate & Investment Banking
UK Asylum Housing Firm Faces Backlash Over £187 Million Profits and Poor Living Conditions
UK Police Crack Major Gang in Smuggling of up to 40,000 Stolen Phones to China
BYD’s UK Sales Soar Nearly Nine-Fold, Making Britain Its Biggest Market Outside China
Trump Proposes Farm Bailout from Tariff Revenues Amid Backlash from Other Industries
FIFA Accuses Malaysia of Forging Citizenship Documents, Suspends Seven Footballers
Latvia to Bar Tourist and Occasional Buses to Russia and Belarus Until 2026
A Dollar Coin Featuring Trump’s Portrait Expected to Be Issued Next Year
Australia Orders X to Block Murder Videos, Citing Online Safety and Public Exposure
Three Scientists Awarded Nobel Prize in Medicine for Discovery of Immune Self-Tolerance Mechanism
OpenAI and AMD Forge Landmark AI-Chip Alliance with Equity Option
Munich Airport Reopens After Second Drone Shutdown
France Names New Government Amid Political Crisis
Trump Stands Firm in Shutdown Showdown and Declares War on Drug Cartels — Turning Crisis into Opportunity
Surge of U.S. Billionaires Transforms London’s Peninsula Apartments into Ultra-Luxury Stronghold
Pro Europe and Anti-War Babiš Poised to Return to Power After Czech Parliamentary Vote
Jeff Bezos Calls AI Surge a ‘Good’ Bubble, Urges Focus on Lasting Innovation
Japan’s Ruling Party Chooses Sanae Takaichi, Clearing Path to First Female Prime Minister
Sean ‘Diddy’ Combs Sentenced to Fifty Months in Prison Following Prostitution Conviction
Taylor Swift’s ‘Showgirl’ Launch Extends Billion-Dollar Empire
Trump Administration Launches “TrumpRx” Plan to Enable Direct Drug Sales at Deep Discounts
Trump Announces Intention to Impose 100 Percent Tariff on Foreign-Made Films
Altman Says GPT-5 Already Outpaces Him, Warns AI Could Automate 40% of Work
×